HP’s plan to lay off 33,000 workers over the next three years — the latest step in its massive restructuring — underscores the challenges the tech giant faces as it seeks to adapt to changing demands in corporate computing.

CIOs, many of whom are under pressure to inject digital capabilities into their businesses and support increasingly mobile workforces, are shifting spending away from enterprise hardware and services to cloud, mobile and analytics software. Incumbent vendors are scrambling to keep up, each in different ways. However, HP’s answer to the challenges is the most dramatic and headline-grabbing.